Leather and Gold
by wannaberedhead
Summary: The doctor often meets people out of order, but when that person fixes clocks for a living and has a better understanding of time than he does, who is to say what the real order is? Ch. 1 features Ten while admitted in the hospital just before the start of the episode "Smith and Jones". As always feedback is openly welcomed.


She knew her time was running out. That soon her frail body, once limber and strong, would fail her and she would slip away from life. Lying listlessly in this uncomfortable hospital bed, she felt as thin and fragile as a sheet of paper. As if at any moment she might simply crumble away leaving nothing but a fine dust where she lay. Yet there was a light still, hidden somewhere deep within her. An instinctive force that willed her heart to keep beating and lungs to keep taking in air.

_Just a little longer_ she thought.

She had always thought that facing death would be a frightening and painful moment. But she was not afraid. Like loosing a tooth or finding a grey hair, this was simply the natural next step in a long, well-lived life. Those left behind would say what a pity it was she died so soon. "Seventy really isn't that old," they would say. "Most people live well into their eighties now, health care being what it is". But were she to hear their pity, she would simply smile knowing that they knew nothing of her lost years.

Her lost years, as she had named them, were not years that she herself had missed out on, but rather years that she lost with her family. Time that should have been saved for a life as a doting grandmother had been frivolously spent in youth leaving her now with barely enough to say her goodbyes. But she would never let anyone think they were a waste.

These were years brimming with excitement and adventure; where every world there ever was lay at your fingertips and reality surpassed your wildest dreams. Everything she thought she knew had been stretched and reshaped until simple things she had once seen as finite, like space and time, were turned on their head and became something new.

And of course, there was him, her lost companion. He had been travelling long before she met him and would continue long after she left, but for a time they got lost together. It was him she was waiting for, holding on to her last tread of life just to say goodbye.

With a little more effort than normal she turned her head to one side to look at the sleeping form of her son. He had fallen asleep in the armchair almost as soon as he sat down. Poor thing.

She closed her eyes for a moment and listened to the sound of her his deep sleeping breaths from across the room and the quiet rhythmic ticking from the table next to her bed. There sat a simple wristwatch keeping time as the seconds passed by. The dark leather strap was well worn and had molded to the shape of her wrist so that as it lay on the table the straps buckled upwards forming two, somewhat lopsided, arches. The face was marked out with gold numbers one through twelve, matching the gold hands that stretched out from the centre.

She lay like this for a while, listening, when a new sound reached her ears. Soft padding footsteps were moving down the hall, pausing every now and then only to start up again with the same quiet urgency as before. She could not help but smile to herself.

_He made it after all_. She thought.

The room grew only a little darker when a figure stopped in the doorway, blocking the light in the hall from reaching in. She turned her head to face him as he surveyed the room, unaware that she was awake. He was different than when she knew him. He was a little taller, his eyes were a little darker, his hair was a little wilder, but she had no doubt. This was him.

"Hello Doctor."

Her voice was rough and small from lack of use but he heard her all the same. A bright smile spread across his face as he turned to face her, but there was no sign of recognition in his eyes. He did not know her yet.

"Oh! No. I'm so sorry but I'm not your doctor," was his apologetic reply. "I'm a patient here actually. See?" He held up the corner of his dark blue robe as evidence. "My bed's just down the hall."

If she had the energy she would have laughed. The thought of him confined to a hospital bed was ridiculous, and clearly not physically possible. She could tell he was ready to set off down the hall again but she couldn't let him go. Not after she had been waiting so long.

"I see. And what are you looking for so late at night?" she asked.

"Oh you know. Nothing really." He strolled further into the room, trying to act casual, but failing miserably.

"Now that's just not true." She said as he bent over at the waist, hands behind his back, and eyes squinted to read the screen of some machine she was hooked up to. "We're all looking for something after all."

This stopped him. He looked over at her as if really seeing her for the first time. She could not quite tell in the dark, but she thought she could see the faintest hint of fear behind his eyes. The kind of fear the only comes when someone hits the nail on the head, exposing something you thought was well hidden.

_That's good,_ she thought. _A little fear will do him good once and a while_.

"Sit down." She gestured to the chair on the opposite wall. "Keep an old girl company for a bit."

He straightened up slowly, unsure of whether to trust her.

"Go on. Bring that chair over. My goodness, did no one ever tell you to obey your elders?"

This made him laugh; leaving a real smile in place of the doubt that had hung in his eyes the moment before. He walked over to pick up the chair, careful not to make too much noise and wake her son.

"Well you certainly aren't afraid of being a little bold, are you?"

"I'm old dear. I've earned it."

"Yes you certainly have." He sat down and made himself comfortable with one leg crossed over the other and both hands on the armrests.

"So what are you doing here really?" She asked.

"I'm on a bit of an…inspection. Reports of abnormal static electricity and odd electrical readings all over this building."

"Ah. Trying to save lives I suppose."

"That's the idea. Doesn't always work though." His smile fell slightly. "Always bound to lose someone, in the end."

"And what's so wrong with losing someone?" She asked bluntly. She had no time left for subtlety.

This took him off guard, and clearly he was not sure how to answer.

"Get as old as me and one day you'll understand." He couldn't help but laugh again. She knew he would like that one.

"I don't think adding on a few more years is going to help that much."

"No, but getting closer to the end will." She smiled sympathetically at him, remembering all the heartbreak he still had ahead of him. "It's one thing to have others leave you. It's something else entirely to be the one who is leaving." She leaned in a little closer. She wanted to make sure he understood this. "A good ending is the most important part of a story. Even if it leaves you in tears, it can't tarnish all the good days that came before it."

"I certainly hope so." was all he managed to say in response. She knew he hated goodbyes, even talking about them made him uncomfortable. He looked around the room for something, anything that might change the topic.

"That watch is lovely." He gestured to the one sitting on her bedside table.

"Yes. It was given to me by a friend of mine…" she stopped, realization filling her eyes. "Take it." She said slowly.

"Oh no I couldn't…"

"No. Please. Let me give it to you. I don't have much use for it anymore and I have a feeling you could use it."

Though he did not understand it, it was clear this meant something to her. So he leant over and carefully picked up the wristwatch looking it over in his hands.

"Thank you." Was all he could think to say in return of such an odd gift. "I should probably get going. Don't want the nurses to panic when they find an empty bed."

She just nodded in reply as he stood up and walked towards the door.

He paused for a moment in the doorway silhouetted against the harsh florescent light of the hallway.

"Goodbye Doctor." She called in her hoarse, faint voice.

"I told you," he said kindly, "I'm not your doctor."

"Yes you are."

With that she looked up to the ceiling, closed her eyes, and listened to his padding footsteps continue off down he hall. She could feel her whole body letting go, relaxing one muscle at a time, until finally, she was gone.

At the same moment, the leather and gold wristwatch sat bumping in the pocket of his robe as he continued searching the hallways, and though he didn't know it, it had stopped ticking. The hands sat frozen in place, indefinitely paused at twelve o'clock.


End file.
